[Ravijai]

Originally Posted by anu21v

My thinking is if they have like 20 dealers and selling 900 cars a month, that means a dealer throughput of 45 per month, and translates to 550 vehicles per annum. .

I read somewhere that they are targeting to reach 75-100 dealers by 2023 end. C3 Aircross would also be joining then. They need to scale it up if they need to be relevant in the market.

[Phantom 510]

My recent Citroen eC3 test drive.
My observations-
1. Stellar ride quality (comfort) over bad patches of the road. It simply dismisses bad patches like a car much more expensive. No wonder Citroen did suspensions for Rolls Royce too. Stability was excellent due to it's long wheelbase and decent grip from it's tyres. Brakes felt pretty good as well. The power steering had offered excellent manoevrability at low speeds and good feedback at higher speeds too.
2. Roomy spacious and superb seat cushioning neither too soft/squishy nor too hard.
3. Fit, finish and build quality seems of high order. The plastics used inside the cabin are of high quality and everything felt rugged and durable. Doors shut with a reassuring thud.
4. Boot and spare wheel stays uncompromised.
5. Surprisingly peppy inspite of dull on paper figures. It lacks the thrust of some EV's but it feels absolutely adequate with it's linear 1.2L NA petrol like power delivery. Roll on acceleration also felt just spot on to perform quick overtakes at 50-85 kmph range. The regen also felt spot on without feeling very strong. It kicked in without letting the driver know.
6. Superb range during the 10 kms test drive without the use of Eco mode. Driving conditions of the test drive included offroad patch with craters to test out ride quality, checked out the acceleration till it's 107 kmph top speed, AC was kept running full blast at lowest temp, encountered crawling b2b traffic and did a steady 75 kmph cruise on open roads as well. I have attached few pictures that might throw some light on it's range.
Thanks!

[randeepsr]

With the plan to launch C3 Aircross the delivery timelines of eC3 seems to have gone up. My delivery timeline inquiry on eC3 came back with 3 months!! Last month it was 3 weeks!

[anu21v]

what I am hearing is that there is a waiting period for eC3 and it is demand-driven and not because of a change of focus of the company or newer launches. Think Citroen is facing some battery shortage issues or maybe they had not planned enough capacity to supply electric care and that is why only 200-300 odd numbers in the last 2 months.

eC3 seems to be the first electric car with any sort of waiting period I guess. That is a good positive signs for electric car lovers.

[Abudhabicars]

Got this as my cabbie today. I was blissfully unaware of knowing that Citroen had launched an EV in India until today. The first thought that comes to mind when seeing this car is that it is much more expensive than the price point it retails at. The front seats have great thigh support and overall good visibility, with height being on par with the usual mini SUV suspects. For a city chauffeur driven car provided one sits in the front, this can be a good option. NVH levels are also much better than the Tiago EV, but somehow I find the interiors of the TATA to feel a notch premium.

[swarnava.ch]

I am in pursuit for the elusive perfect City EV. As part of the pursuit, registered for the test Drive of the eC3 at home.
Here is a brief summary of the Test Drive impressions:

The Good:
1. Very smooth TD experience. Received callback to confirm preferred time, arrived right on time and no fuss. Very professional dealing with the SA.
2. Car looks nice from outside with bright colors and contrast roof.
3. TD car had done 6000 kms so far and was 4 months old. Considering the abuse, the condition held up well. No complaints except some external paint chips.
4. Interior color scheme (Seats + Dash) is dark which is nice should be easier to maintain. The plastics, though hard ones, was sturdy and were built well.
5. The ride quality was just fantastic – over broken roads, speed bumps, un even roads etc it just glides. What helps is the chunky wheels with thick sidewalls. Was able to maneuver the car inside the parking.
6. The car had creep function – lift up the acc pedal and the car moves ahead at slow speeds.
7. The Gear toggle switch would take some getting used to specially for 2 point turns etc.
8. Overall NVH levels inside the cabin is great. Not much outside road noise. Mellow horns, not intrusive inside cabin.
9. Seats were nice in the front. Roomy at the rear. Decent for 5 passengers.
10. Steering feel and feedback was good. A soft touch cover would do wonders.
11. Even at AC blower speed set at 1, and temperature to cool, the AC worked really well.
12. Good bootspace, better than some of the other EVs. Had a proper spare as well.

The Neutral
13. Gradual and smooth acceleration even when you kick down on the accelerator. No sudden leaping ahead. This is good and bad both. You will have to plan your overtakes carefully due to this but it also means that the car drives like my AMT
14. Don’t have enough feedback from real owners on the battery performance and charging experience. I requested my SA to connect me with some real owners to take feedback and She agreed readily.
15. Two showrooms in Bangalore. Citroen offers service on wheels but service station is a bit far away from home. RSA on offer.
16. Driving in the normal mode was an easy experience. There was a Eco mode available which further dulled the acceleration. This can be great for new car drivers and learners.


The Bad:
17. Only two Airbags, no ESP. Only ABS with EBD.
18. Only three years warranty on the car & 7 years on battery. Extended warranty is not clear yet.
19. The interiors looked very old school – lacked features. Even basic features missing which are a must - such as auto AC, Rear view camera, ORVM auto adjust, Rear wipers etc.
20. No window open switches on the back doors, its placed in the central armrest console. Needed some getting used to.
21. Starting the car was a bit of a surprise for us. First thing was the manual key – you have to put it in and do 1 turn – this brings up all electronics. But you cant drive yet. Then like an ICE car, you have to do one more half turn and then the car gets in the Ready mode which is indicated on the console with a light and shrill beep. Now you can drive after putting it into drive mode.
22. No hill hold, car rolls back on inclines. However was able to manage with brake and Acc pedal. Didn’t perceive the Acc cutoff with brakes pushed.
23. The Driver console is very very basic – does not suit a 12L+ car.
24. The 10 inch screen in the middle – though looks big compared to many other cars, but the experience was not good. I wanted to connect my phone to test music quality, however could not pair the phone, it simply didn’t search for the phone Bluetooth. Then I tried to delete the existing BT connections shown but it hung. Had to contend with FM music. Sound – though loud, lacked base. May be there are some sound settings but I didn’t explore further.
25. I could not try android auto but I have my doubt if the maps would really come up on the whole screen due to the landscape nature of the screen.
26. No rear AC vents to cool the rear compartment quickly.
27. The battery pack in the floor eats into ground clearance. One of the places where I was driving, the car floor touched a hump due to broken road.
28. The car only comes with a 3.5 Kw AC home charger. The TD person said – it will take 8-10 hours for a full charge on home AC. DC charge is possible at fast chargers.

In my excitement, I could not keep a track of the efficiency or range drop. The SA told me – expected range on a full charge will be 230 - 250 depending on driving pattern.

Final verdict from Finance Ministry – The car has great ride on offer but does not fit to be in the 12L price segment. Imagine we are comparing this with our Nios Asta AMT.
Next steps – If the C3 Air cross is launched in EV, it will be a good option for us. Till then this remains on our list of potential candidates on position 2.

Otherwise have to wait for Tata Punch EV – which has already started doing tests in camo. I am not in a hurry as my car lease expires in Feb 2024.

Quick check on this forum - are there any real owners here who can share some more experience over a real life usage of 3- 6 months ?

[Comrade]

I wish Citroen would release eC3 Shine variant with instrument cluster from c3 aircross and 7 kwh AC charging capability. Would be a decent City car even with some design blunders like rear power windows & manual AC controls. Somehow I have started doubting Tata’s EV engineering prowess with so many bhpians reporting ‘High Voltage Critical Alert’. It seems the error is a given experience for every Tata EV owner!

[Shresth_EV]

Originally Posted by anu21v

eC3 seems to be the first electric car with any sort of waiting period I guess. That is a good positive signs for electric car lovers.

Not true. Nexon EV had significant waiting period in Delhi and mumbai after initial months of launch due to lucrative first come first serve subsidy.

At the time of our own delivery, we had booked around Dussehra 2021 but our delivery was in November end (28th)

That was around 2-3mo waiting easily. This was demand driven not semiconductor driven.

[guptad42]

Originally Posted by Comrade

I wish Citroen would release eC3 Shine variant with instrument cluster from c3 aircross and 7 kwh AC charging capability. Would be a decent City car even with some design blunders like rear power windows & manual AC controls. Somehow I have started doubting Tata’s EV engineering prowess with so many bhpians reporting ‘High Voltage Critical Alert’. It seems the error is a given experience for every Tata EV owner!

You may want to be careful. There are several reports of eC3 battery problems. The car is not living up to Citroen's claims of continuous fast charging. You can find one such example here:

https://youtu.be/8kgBNXop1j8

According to the owner, eC3's passive cooled battery tends to overheat with DC charging if the outside ambient temperature is higher (e.g. afternoons vs late evening or night).

It also raises the risk that battery degradation may be much faster than liquid cooled batteries in Tata EVs. Citroen did not learn the lesson from Nissan Leaf.

Besides, it is hard to justify the nearly 13Lac on-road price for a car that screams cost-cutting all around. Citroen needs a revised product strategy for India, if they want to have a profitable long-term future in this country. Else, they will end up running away like GM and Ford.

[swarnava.ch]

Originally Posted by guptad42

You may want to be careful. There are several reports of eC3 battery problems. The car is not living up to Citroen's claims of continuous fast charging. You can find one such example here:

According to the owner, eC3's passive cooled battery tends to overheat with DC charging if the outside ambient temperature is higher (e.g. afternoons vs late evening or night).

Thanks for this video guptad42. This was a really troubling feedback from the owner. If you cannot charge at Fast chargers along the highways during long trips, this will highly curtail intercity commutes ad make this only an intracity car. At least with liquid cooling, you would have an option to charge a in-between such trips. Besides most of such trips will be during day time itself when ambient temp will be high. So this is really unfortunate.

[Comrade]

Originally Posted by guptad42

According to the owner, eC3's passive cooled battery tends to overheat with DC charging if the outside ambient temperature is higher (e.g. afternoons vs late evening or night).

Yeah, DC fast charging seems to be a definite issue! I have seen another set of videos too where DC fast charging was not working 100% but that vlogger blamed charger more than the car

https://youtu.be/4d7Ou42AMF0

We still don't know long term reliability of eC3 (and we may never know seeing the acceptance rate of the car). Nevertheless, Tata also does not seem to have figured out BMS issues completely! Below messages seem to be too common on team-bhp. I hope these are stray incidents considering the number of EVs Tata sells every month but it is discomforting atleast for me.

Originally Posted by Zappex

High voltage critical alert

Originally Posted by anshumandun

HV CRITICAL ALERT

Originally Posted by Nanolover

HV critical failure

Originally Posted by tarunjain

HV System Fault

Originally Posted by prateekchanana

HV Critical alert

Originally Posted by cool_dube

sudden drop in SOC

Originally Posted by Eco_boost

BMS (Battery management system)

Originally Posted by Ankit998

HV Battery System Fault

Originally Posted by Holyghost

electrical fault icon (4 whatsapp members after fast charging)

[guptad42]

Originally Posted by Comrade

Yeah, DC fast charging seems to be a definite issue! I have seen another set of videos too where DC fast charging was not working 100% but that vlogger blamed charger more than the car
...

We still don't know long term reliability of eC3 (and we may never know seeing the acceptance rate of the car). Nevertheless, Tata also does not seem to have figured out BMS issues completely! Below messages seem to be too common on team-bhp. I hope these are stray incidents considering the number of EVs Tata sells every month but it is discomforting atleast for me.

You are spot on. Nexon EV has sold so many cars now that Tata Motors has the motivation to solve the BMS issues and establish a reliance EV platform for Indian conditions. eC3 sells in such small numbers that Citroen may never bother to fix the issues. It may be cheaper for Citroen to buy back the faulty cars. Or just ignore the EV problems. Frankly, Citroen sell so few petrol cars in India that one cannot be sure that they won't repeat GM and Ford's history in India.

Tata Motors needs to pay more attention to battery issues and ensure that a clear message goes out that Tata Motors is standing behind its EV batteries. These HV battery issues are indeed worrying.

If the Tata EV problems are due to BMS, we can hope a BMS software update or replacing the chips/circuit board with a more reliable design could solve the issue. Tata Motors also has a history of fixing known problems in initial versions of the car by providing updates at no extra cost to the buyers. With the eC3, the problem is baked into the design of EV battery pack. Citroen cannot add back active liquid cooling with an update to existing cars.

[electric_eel]

Originally Posted by guptad42

With the eC3, the problem is baked into the design of EV battery pack. Citroen cannot add back active liquid cooling with an update to existing cars.

The two things that TATA got right is (1) Base their Ziptron platform on LFP battery chemistry instead of NMC and (2) Liquid cooling of battery pack. Any mass market EV for India should have these and I would rule out eC3 purely for this reason.

[Vikram9193]

The owner who reported fast charging issues has an update on Youtube. Things may be better now.

12-13kwh charging is substantially slower than the Tiago’s 17-18kwh and the battery pack is also bigger, so summer charging stops will be notably longer than the already slow Tiago. On the other hand the range is about 30-40km more, so you may need less of a top-up charge if your destination isn’t too far.

Why I can’t get this car out of my head is because the seat height adjust goes low enough to feel like a hatchback in the twisties, which I love, and also high enough to feel like a micro-SUV in the traffic. The Nexon is a bit of a tank and seems too tall and heavy to be a good EV platform. The Punch is also a little taller I think. Then again the Punch EV and the upcoming Nexon EV may come with faster charging speeds given the chatter about Gen 2 EVs.

[Venky03]

Enquired about the eC3 with the Citroen Mumbai dealership, and asked them 2 questions :

1) Does the battery have any IP rating?

To which they replied : It is IP67 rated.

2) Why did you opt for passive cooling instead of active cooling?

To which they replied : Our pack has prismatic cells instead of cylindrical cells used by our competitors. Because of this our pack has more space between cells, also a dry material (I assume phase change?) to facilitate heat transfer from the cells.

Follow up question from my side : Why is the IP rating and all of the information regarding battery not mentioned on your official website?

To which they replied : We are confident in our product, most of the parts are from sourced from BYD, which is one of the most reputed electric vehicle manufacturer globally.

On the plus side, the advisor was actually interested in answering my questions rather than dodging them. But Citroen has a lot to work on, I can't understand why they've skipped this crucial info regarding the IP rating and battery design from their website and product brochures.